


canards

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Developing Relationship, Getting to Know Each Other, M/M, Politics, Pre-Rogue One, Robot Feels, Robot/Human Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-27
Updated: 2017-11-27
Packaged: 2019-01-26 08:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12552892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: Cassian could lie to him; he’d gotten pretty good at that over the years, after all. He might even believe Cassian. And yet, he couldn’t. “They don’t trust you,” he replied. “They don’t trust easily,” an elaboration. He and the Rebellion had at least that much in common. “That’s no excuse.”“It sounds like one to me.”





	canards

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Artemis1000](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artemis1000/gifts).



Cassian stared down at his plate, his fingers tight around the silver metal utensils in his hands as he did his damnedest to mind his own business. At a nearby table, a handful of his compatriots sat, whispering—not low enough for Cassian to avoid hearing them, of course, but low enough for Cassian to realize he wasn’t supposed to be hearing what they had to say. Which was this: “I don’t trust that new droid, the Imp. What was it? A KX unit? Nasty kriffing pieces of work, Imp security bots.”

“Ugly things,” his friend agreed, shoveling his meal into his mouth indiscriminately.

Cassian felt the first one’s eyes fall onto him, his stare a heavy, cloying weight, like a hand pressing against every inch of him and finding him wanting. If Cassian were capable of shrinking at such things, that glance would do it, but he was made of sterner stuff than Corporal Savvics and wouldn’t do more than disdainfully disregard every bit of attention sent his way. The story was as old as the Clone Wars and tired besides.

“I guess we’d better hope Captain Andor knows what he’s doing,” the first one added, more impressed with the sound of his own voice than in anything his companion had to say.

“Separatists always did know their way around droids a little better than the rest of us. Probably knows all the best buttons to press,” said companion, a Lieutenant Faiola if Cassian remembered correctly, replied, trite and tedious. Years of such innuendo had long ago vaccinated Cassian against the dirtier, darker implications inherent to it, but that was before Cassian had clamored and clawed his way into a role in this Rebellion. He didn’t need anyone’s approval, but it would have been nice to be able to slough off the bullshit that came along with a home planet he hadn’t set foot on—or had the chance to fight for directly—in at least ten years. “I’m sure we’re safe.”

Dragging in a deep, angry breath, Cassian pushed himself to his feet. The duraplast chair clattered to the floor, drawing Savvics and Faiola’s attention as well as the attention of every single person in the room. Their eyes widened with fear—Cassian was viciously proud of that fact, even if he was also monumentally embarrassed by the eyes turned his way—and their gazes dropped with a suddenness that would’ve made anyone suspicious. Savvics’s pale cheeks turned a brilliant shade of red. That, too, was gratifying in its small way.

A thousand cutting words came to mind, a dressing down worthy of General Draven on his lips, but instead of speaking his mind, he threw his fork at his tray and picked the whole thing up, depositing it into the recycling pod nearest to the pair.

Where before the room had at least been filled with chatter, now a chilly, silent pall fell, spreading across every table to every person. As soon as he was gone, they’d go right back to talking—and worst of all, about him—but for now, all that mattered was he no longer had to hear about any of it.

Fuck them, he thought. What in the coldest depths of hell did they know about anything anyway?

*

Days off in the Rebellion were in short supply, especially for those in Operations, and for Cassian in particular. There was a time, he thought, when moments to spare were less scarce, but over the years he’d been a part of the Rebellion, inducted in by Fulcrum herself—the original Fulcrum, though he’d met other Fulcrums in his time—he’d found the opportunity to sit still and do something for himself a rare curse.

“What do you mean, Senator?” he asked, at parade rest across Mon Mothma’s desk.

“I mean there’s not a lot we can about this while General Merrick and Blue Squadron are scouting Galae’s planetary defenses,” she replied. “General Draven would have mentioned this to you, I’m sure.” It wasn’t a rebuke exactly, but skepticism and curiosity undercut the otherwise innocuous delivery of her words. No, he wasn’t trying to undermine Draven, but it might well have sounded like it to her. This, of course, was Cassian’s latest mission. And his last orders, issued by Draven days ago now, were to hold tight and _take a Force-damned break, Andor, I don’t want to hear any more about it_.

“Of course, Senator. I meant no disrespect. I only wonder that—”

Mothma raised a hand, forestalling his further complaints with the mere exposure of her palm. Swallowing the rest of his words, he waited for her to speak. “We have no idea when Blue Squadron will return, so I can’t send you anywhere else. I know there doesn’t seem to be a lot to do here right now.” The dryness of her tone belied her disbelief. For many, there was still more than enough to occupy their time here in their temple base. It was only the field operatives and pilots who had a hard time of it when they were grounded—and even then, at least the pilots could work on maintenance. “Perhaps you might like to work with that KX-unit you brought back from Wecacoe?”

His posture, already straight and rigid, snapped even tighter. Not her, too. Though he tried, he couldn’t quite keep the crispness out of his voice. ”Ma’am?”

She seemed to sense she’d said something wrong and peered up at him even more curiously than before. “We have him doing strategic analysis of a handful of our least sensitive operations. He’s done well so far, but I believe a few of the other analysts are having a hard time connecting with him. I thought he might benefit from your input. Is that a problem, Captain Andor?”

“No,” he answered, biting back a more thorough retort. _Why is it you think I’d be more capable of handling a droid, Senator?_ “Of course not. Thank you, Senator.”

He reached the door, prepared to palm the lock and complete the task she’d set for him, but one last thing bothered him. Like a broken tooth, it would’ve troubled him until he ripped it free. “His name is Kay-Tuesso, ma’am.”

Free days were curses. That remained as true now as it had been before he’d gone to Senator Mothma’s office hoping that she could provide him with a task when Draven wouldn’t. Of course, she’d somehow pick something like this, the one thing he didn’t need more of in his life. But at least it was something to do and might actually keep his mind off of the fact that he had a mission. So far, it had just been a twitching, tense thing in the back of his thoughts. All day, all night, plans and scenarios wormed and flashed their way across his consciousness. He couldn’t rest and he couldn’t take a break and the only thing that ever helped was work.

Well, K-2 was definitely work, that was for sure.

They’d stowed the droid in one of the more distant labs for reasons that Cassian could easily guess if not particularly appreciate. Cassian frowned at the open doorway and knocked on the inside wall, leaning in and peering around. K-2’s back was turned, his wide shoulders dull gray beneath the harsh lights, and he said nothing to suggest that Cassian was welcome to enter. Instead, his vocoder emitted low, almost rhythmic tones.

“Are you humming?” Cassian asked, despite K-2 not acknowledging his arrival when he first knocked.

“What?” K-2 twisted around with rather more coordination than most other droids of his type displayed. “Oh, it’s you.”

A smile twitched at the corner of Cassian’s mouth. “Yes,” he replied. “It’s me. Well done.”

K-2’s head tipped down and back up again, his ocular sensors flashing with recognition. “You humans are hard to distinguish.”

“Wasn’t that part of your programming?”

“You reprogrammed me.” K-2 offered the droid equivalent of a shrug. His joints squeaked, but before Cassian could complain, he added, “Perhaps you might consider being better at that if you’re so concerned.”

“There might be a droid out there somewhere who’d have been grateful for what I did, you know.” Cassian had heard all sorts of stories about droids developing personalities and preferences, both personal and professional and everything in between, as deeply nuanced as anything an organic being could lay claim to. Sure, many of them were wiped rather than grapple with that shift, but clearly K-2 wasn’t one of them. He had enough personality already for any two organics, let alone droids. “Unshackling you from your Imperial programming wasn’t easy.”

“You won’t be getting a thank you out of me.” K-2 sniffed, disdainful. Or did the droid equivalent of it anyway. “If that’s what you’re looking for.”

Cassian crossed his arms. “I wasn’t. That’s not what I want at all.” In fact, Cassian had no clue what he wanted.

K-2’s head tilted to the side. “Then why are you here?”

Now that was a question worthy of any intelligence agent, if not a subtle enough of one for Cassian’s tastes. Perhaps he could teach K-2. “I’ve been tasked with assisting you.”

“Your leaders don’t trust me?” And though it was phrased like a question, Cassian got the distinct impression that he wasn’t asking.

Cassian ached for him. Frankly, it wasn’t K-2’s fault he was here. This was Cassian’s mess, his own ingenuity and lack of forethought come back to haunt him. He’d learned to do what he had to do and at the time he’d needed K-2 on his side. The fact that he’d dumped the Imperial-branded K-2 on a Rebel base and fought to keep him, finding excuse after excuse about why he should be here. Imagine the intel, he’d said. We can’t just leave him out there in the galaxy to be scooped back up by the Imperials.

 _Why not wipe him entirely?_ — He might revert to his Imperial programming. It would be a danger.

 _We could scrap him and save ourselves the trouble_. — What if a piece survived. He’s already been here. It’s too great of a security risk.

If there was an answer, Cassian had given it.

The only true answer, the one that mattered to Cassian in the end, was the only one he never used: he didn’t have the heart to kill K-2 and he wouldn’t let anyone else do it either. For a man who’d long ago subdued, strangled, and otherwise annihilated that part of himself, it was a disconcerting sensation, but one he hadn’t been able to ignore.

So now K-2 was stuck down here, logging tedious hours doing the scutwork no one else wanted to do while not even being afforded the dignity of knowing the people who held his life in their hands trusted him with even that small task.

Perhaps it would have been more merciful to let him die or leave him where he was to complete the work he’d been created to do. It wasn’t like the Empire was significantly _less_ dangerous without him.

Would K-2 blame him if he could?

That was a question Cassian wasn’t sure he wanted answered, a dangerous proposition for a spy, who needed every bit of information they could get and more besides.

Cassian could lie to him; he’d gotten pretty good at that over the years, after all. He might even believe Cassian. And yet, he couldn’t. “They don’t trust you,” he replied. “They don’t trust easily,” an elaboration. He and the Rebellion had at least that much in common. “That’s no excuse.”

“It sounds like one to me.”

Cassian fought back a sigh. Instead of arguing, he said, “You’re not wrong. But can we maybe move on from this discussion to why I’m actually here?”

K-2’s joints squeaked again as he shifted. He really needed to have some maintenance done. Had anyone seen fit to run him through an oil bath? “And why are you here?”

Swallowing, Cassian stepped into the room, and shivering, he scrubbed his hands over his arms, chafing them through the rough linen of his shirt. It wasn’t cold enough to freeze anyone to death, but it certainly wasn’t comfortable. “Are your circuits graded for low-temperature environments?”

“What?” K-2 asked sharply. His ocular sensors flickered and if Cassian didn’t know any better—which, honestly, he didn’t, not yet—he’d have said the droid was angry with him.

“I’m sorry if—” Cassian found himself off-balance at the scrutiny. He didn’t make much of a habit of apologizing to people, most of the individuals who deserved it were already dead, often by his own hand.

“Who _are_ you?” He stepped closer, looming over Cassian while staring down at him. “Why would you care about my grading? You’re not a droid tech.”

“That’s none of your business,” Cassian countered. His nerves twined about his stomach, heat rising through him. It wasn’t shame that coursed in his blood, at least he wouldn’t have called it such. In his mind, it was more complicated than that. But what wasn’t? Nothing in his life had been easy for him before now and he didn’t anticipate that changing any time soon. Leave it to K-2 to get under his skin and sit there, finding the part of himself he didn’t want exposed.

They didn’t know each other; Cassian had no reason to react as strongly to him as he did.

“Is it not?” K-2 returned to his work station like he was unconcerned that Cassian was so recalcitrant and merely completing a social contract he hadn’t seemed to care about in the handful of weeks they’d known each other.

Maybe that was why he decided to speak up. For whatever reason, fate had thrown them together. The least Cassian could do was do his part to not waste the opportunity thrown his way. This was, after all, entirely his fault. K-2 wouldn’t be here if not for him. “I’m from Fest.”

“I care about that fact why?”

Now it was Cassian’s turn to step close to K-2, close enough that he could smell the familiar mingling of metal and grease. Heavy and cloying to most people, Cassian merely found it comforting. “Fest was a Separatist world during the war.” In Cassian’s mind, that was still the war. Everything that came after was… something else. “My earliest memories were of droids protecting the people of my world and other worlds.”

“And?”

Cassian’s chin tipped up slightly and he waited until he had K-2’s attention entirely on him. “I respect the work droids do. I would rather not treat them as though they are resources to be used and discarded.”

“Didn’t the Separatists do just that?” K-2 bent forward, his head coming within inches of Cassian’s. “We were cannon fodder to them.”

Cassian’s hair fell into his eyes as he shook his head. “To Confederacy leadership, perhaps, but not to the people.” _Or not all of them anyway_. “But that’s not the point. The point is, that’s why I care. You can take that answer or leave it, but there’s no better one that I can give to you.”

K-2’s metal spine curved upward, his body straightening again. His ocular sensors again focused on his work. “My circuits are graded for this environment as it is. I am, as you might say, perfectly comfortable here.” He made a strange sound with his vocoder. “Thank you for your concern, Captain Andor.”

“Cassian.” He cleared his throat, coughing into his fist. “It’s Cassian.”

“Of course.” After a pause, K-2 nodded. “Cassian. That is acceptable.”

They didn’t get much in the way of work done—at least Cassian didn’t—but K-2 didn’t kick him out and Cassian forgot for a time about the mission he was waiting to be deployed on. And that wasn’t nothing.

*

Staring down at the smoking remains of the Imperial officer before him, Cassian dragged in a deep, relieved breath. His mind swirled with overdue fear and adrenaline. He could have died just now. And he would have if not for K-2. “Why did you— _how?_ “

Cassian hadn’t reprogrammed him to be a murderer. He hadn’t intended to turn him into a weapon. He hadn’t come along with Cassian to be a guard droid. He was to play a support role only. “Where did you get a blaster?”

Quickly, K-2 tossed it aside. “I stole it,” he admitted, pointing to another body. “From him.”

Shit. _Shit_. “You shouldn’t be here.” Swallowing, he gestured wildly, his limbs still affected by his fight-or-flight response. He’d thought himself over this; but apparently not. _Apparently_ , he could still feel it. And in front of K-2 no less. Regardless, Draven and Mothma hadn’t allowed Cassian to bring K-2 along because he was a free-thinking droid, no. They’d sent him along as a test and if he admitted that he couldn’t convince K-2 to obey orders, he’d be scrapped. “I told you to stay back at the ship. What if you’d been caught?”

“What if _you’d_ been caught? What would I have done?”

Shaking fingers pushed through his sweat-slick bangs. “Flown the ship out of here?”

“Without you? And how would the Rebellion have reacted to that? They wouldn’t have welcomed me back with open arms, Cassian. I’m here to protect you. That’s my job. I am still a security droid. You couldn’t change that about me.”

Choosing to ignore the second part, Cassian replied to the first. “So you saved me to protect yourself, hmm?” He let himself be amused by the possibility. It wasn’t like Cassian could blame him for that. “Well, I can live with that.”

“I suppose you will have to,” he answered, prim, “given how this day has ended.”

Cassian huffed, amused and darkly so. “Oh, let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Kay. The day’s not over yet. We still have to get off of Galae in one piece.”

“We have a seventy-nine percent chance of succeeding. From what I’ve read, you’ve made it out of far worse situations unscathed—” He stopped for a moment. “You just called me Kay.”

“I—is that a problem?” He hadn’t even realized he’d done it. Flustered, he shoved his hands into his pockets and nodded toward their ship. “Should we go?” His face heated and as much as he would have liked to believe K-2 couldn’t tell, he knew that most droids, even KX-units, contained temperature sensors. “Why don’t we go?”

“Okay, Cassian,” K-2 said, cutting Cassian an amount of slack Cassian didn’t expect. One day, he would get to know K-2 better and realize this meant trouble, but at this moment, he was just happy to get out of here without further questions.

“Good. Yes.” Cassian threw his arm out and pushed his way past K-2’s heavy, hulking body. “What are we waiting for?”

“Indeed,” K-2 answered agreeably. “What _are_ we waiting for?”

“Did I thank you yet?” Cassian said, throwing the words over his shoulder.

“No.”

“Thank you, Kaytoo.” Wry, finding some semblance of balance as he climbed up the ship’s ramp, he dredged up a smile from somewhere in the depths of his worry. “Please never disobey orders again.”

K-2 began to protest—of course he did—but as Cassian immersed himself in getting the ship prepped for take off, he chose to ignore it.

That didn’t stop K-2 from protesting, but the indignant chatter didn’t bother Cassian all that much.

In fact, it was soothing in a lot of ways.

That was an interesting development. One that Cassian would never, ever think about too closely if he had any say in the matter.

*

Later, after a heavily edited debriefing with Draven and a ‘chat’ with Mothma, K-2 remaining suspiciously quiet the whole time—so he _could_ obey orders, that was good to know—Cassian accompanied K-2 back to his lab. Along the way, they received more than a few turned heads and, in return, those turned heads were glared at, but K-2 either did not care or didn’t notice, because he merely kept silent the whole way. It was astonishing; it was possibly the longest he’d ever gone without hearing K-2 speak since they’d been in company again. It was enough that Cassian itched to fill the silences and that—never happened.

Only once they reached the threshold of K-2’s door did K-2 finally see fit to offer up his opinion.

“I’m not like one of those Separatist droids, Cassian,” he said as serious as Cassian had heard him all day and even though Cassian had wanted to hear his voice again, suddenly he found himself wishing K-2 would stop this line of thought immediately. It would lead nowhere good. “I’m not a hero.”

Cassian swallowed, his throat suddenly parched. Shifting his weight from foot to foot, he bit his lip and then stopped himself, already embarrassed enough at K-2’s assertion. He didn’t need K-2 to have more physical evidence of his discomfort. Cassian could only imagining what else he was cataloging that Cassian wasn’t hyper aware of. “Nobody’s a hero anymore,” Cassian managed, an attempt at a joke, one that fell flat and only left him feeling more exposed. “That doesn’t make you special.”

Cassian had never been very funny, not even when he used to have a better opinion of the galaxy and his place in it.

“Right,” K-2 said, drawing the word out with his incredulity. “I did save your life though. I suppose that is heroic in a way.”

He had to set the record straight. Now. He wouldn’t be able to work with K-2 otherwise and that would be a shame. He hadn’t lied to Draven when he told him that K-2 was a valuable asset out in the field. “I don’t think you’re a hero, Kay—too. I think you’re an excellent analyst. I feel responsible for you. I—” And this was the hardest part truly. “I like you.”

“Because I’m a droid?”

Anger flared to life inside of him and quickly burned itself out on the kindling of his annoyance. There was nothing left inside of him for fuel, not on this particular score. He was so used to it that he couldn’t bring himself to be more than vaguely pissed. And this was K-2. If anyone had any right to question Cassian about this, it was him. “No! Yes. I don’t—it’s not like that.” He knew some of the… colorful slang terms some people used to describe Separatists and former Separatists. Lascivious and crude, they’d never applied to Cassian. “I don’t have a fetish.”

K-2’s eyes flickered as his head and upper body jerked backward. If any droid could express surprise—and Cassian well knew they could—it was K-2 here and now as Cassian spit out that word. Fetish. It made what Cassian felt seem both more and less than what it was and it was something every former Separatist was forced to grapple with at one point or another. It was probably the one point that rebels from the loyalists and Imperials could agree on: Separatists were droidfuckers, the lot of them.

“I didn’t mean—” K-2 did something Cassian had never heard him do before: he sighed. Dramatically and deeply disgusted. “I didn’t mean it like that, Cassian.”

“Yeah, well.” Backing up, Cassian shrugged. He wasn’t going to have this conversation now, not when all he could think of was K-2 in contexts he really didn’t need on his mind right now. It was true; he did like K-2. And given enough time, he could probably _like_ K-2, too. “Who does?”

K-2 didn’t follow him, not that Cassian expected him to. He was both relieved and unhappy with the realization. The worst thing K-2 could have done right then was trail after him, but Cassian kind of wanted it anyway.

 _Well done, Kay. You’re smarter than me_.

*

With Galae knocked off the list of operations to complete, it was another waiting game; Cassian ended up with more and more spare hours to fill, important enough now that he was only getting the big missions. A victim of his own success, Draven had called him a time or two. So many of the smaller ops were handled or given over to newer recruits who needed to take every mission that would likely not end in them getting killed. Training out in the field was, of course, necessary. There was only so much that Cassian could do for the recruits from here. As thorough as his exercises were, they weren’t live and they weren’t spontaneous. He understood, but it didn’t make it easier.

And he’d already complained once to Mon Mothma. He couldn’t go to her again.

He had only one option and he didn’t like it, not in the slightest. But if he wanted to be useful, this was how he could do it. Tiny pinpricks of guilt stabbed at him. Individually, they were nothing he couldn’t slough off with no effort. It was just the sheer number that threatened to overwhelm him.

 _You’ll have to talk to him again eventually_ , he reasoned with himself. _Just because you made a fool of yourself and he thinks you only want to fuck him is no excuse to avoid him. Draven’s already got him slotted in on the next mission. You have to talk to him_.

Another part of him balked at that. If he was so concerned about it, he could talk to Cassian first. But even though it had been a couple of days, Cassian hadn’t heard anything from him. Not even a report on his analysis of their actions on Galae crossed Cassian’s datapad. And he would know, because he’d been glued to it ever since, purportedly to go over intel for their next strike, bits and pieces that Cassian still hadn’t been able to buil into a complete whole in his mind. The Empire was doing something with Leviria X, but he couldn’t decide what it was. All he knew was he had a contact and a set date to meet said contact that was too far into the future to be of any use to him now.

Everything else was down to whatever the scouts could pick up without exposing themselves to too much danger.

 _Maybe I could learn to be a starfighter pilot_ , he thought. That would certainly give him more to do. He could manage the U-wing just fine, particularly with K-2 at the helm as well, but a starfighter required coordination that may well have been beyond him.

It would be a challenge. And that was exactly what Cassian needed and craved. Anything to take his mind off of K-2SO.

As his door chimed an alarm stating he had a visitor—and a rather insistent one at that if the way they leaned on the bell was any indication—he hoped it was word from Blue Squadron. An early report. Some datascans. Anything to avoid completing the task he’d unwittingly set for himself when he whined at Mothma for more to do. Hell, he’d even have taken over weapons training for everybody if someone would let him.

They wouldn’t let him, of course. He’d already tried that way back before K-2 even entered the picture. Commander Iue still hated Cassian for stepping on his territory.

“I’m coming,” Cassian said, more unwelcoming than he actually intended to be, but still fully lacking in the friendliness that most people expected when then went to visit friends and coworkers. “What do you—oh.”

When presented with a great wall of gray metal, Cassian could only reach one conclusion. “It’s you.” Despite his better judgment, Cassian stepped back and let him in. For a moment, he wondered what K-2 thought of the place. Did he consider it adequate? Or sparse? Or too much? Looking around, Cassian tried to see it the way a droid would—and K-2 in particular—and decided a droid wouldn’t care one way or the other except to know whether there was a charging port or not. Which, come to think of it, there was.

Cassian winced.

“Well, what do you want?” he asked, well aware he was taking his frustrations out on a comparatively innocent party.

K-2’s head swiveled around and he had to duck to cross the threshold. His bulk seemed to fill the entire place, leaving little enough room for Cassian.

A tiny, traitorous part of his mind told him that it didn’t mind the intrusion in the slightest.

“This is where you live?” K-2 asked.

“Did you come all this way to ask that or are you just making small talk?”

“I—okay. That’s fair. I know this is your domicile. I hacked into—”

“You what?!”

“I didn’t want to ask anyone, so I pulled up the housing assignments on the Rebellion mainframe. It was pretty easy to be entirely honest. You might want to—”

“You can’t just hack into the Rebellion computers, Kay,” he hissed. How could K-2 be that careless? Did he want to get decommissioned?

K-2 sniffed. “They shouldn’t have been so imminently hackable then. I’m considering writing a recommendation to Senator Mothma suggesting she find a few slicers to update the security mainframe. Anyway, I just wanted to—to apologize. To you. For presuming things I shouldn’t have presumed.” His long-appendaged hands wrung together, metal rods clacking against metal rods. It was a profoundly telling gesture and Cassian was left wondering why he’d let Cassian see it. “I appreciate that you—like me.”

Cassian felt just like a child back in primary school, back before the fighting came to Fest, back when he could worry about things like liking someone. His palms sweated and he was far too hot. Tugging at his tunic, he turned away to grab a glass of water from the ‘fresher. He almost offered one to K-2 before he awkwardly choked on the thought. What was K-2 going to do with water? “Let me—let me read your recommendation before you send it, please,” he said, weak, conveniently ignoring the rest of K-2’s statement. It was all very well and good that K-2 appreciated that, but it wasn’t something Cassian could deal with right now.

“It—might be too late for that.”

“I thought you said you were considering it.”

“I was. I did.” He shrugged. “And then I wrote it and sent it. I wouldn’t want the base to be compromised while you’re here.”

Cassian’s eyes closed and he groaned. Droids. They always were a little faster than everyone else, weren’t they? “You didn’t send it to General Draven, too, did you?”

“No.”

“Thank the Makers,” Cassian muttered before downing the majority of his water and going back for a refill. Perhaps K-2 wouldn’t be scrapped for parts or worse, smelted down into molten metal and turned into blaster casings or something. Maybe Mon Mothma would be sympathetic. Or at least she might ask Cassian for his input before she summarily execu- _decommissioned_ him.

Ignorant of the danger he found himself in for the initiative he’d shown, he said, “I don’t think I’d mind it if you did like me. You’re different from the others. Tolerable.”

Tolerable. How romantic.

Cassian had no idea what that meant and wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to know. He hadn’t exactly planned on expressing affection for a droid, let alone one he barely knew. And he’d never anticipated a droid saying he wouldn’t mind it if he did, heedless of the complications, the problems a human and a droid _liking_ one another could lead to.

But, well. It was good to know, wasn’t it? Pleased, he said, “I don’t think anyone has ever told me I’m tolerable before.”

“Then they are fools.”

“Oh.” Well, that was… nice to hear. He supposed. Possibly. A little weird, but Cassian couldn’t say he minded. Whatever it was K-2 saw in him, he couldn’t imagine, but Cassian, though a liar, refused to deny to himself that he was curious about where their relationship could go. “I still don’t have a fetish,” he insisted. But the thought of being with K-2 didn’t exactly fill him with dread, not the way he felt when others imagined the kind of things Cassian did because of where he came from. They could bother him with it all they wanted, but he didn’t want K-2 dragged into it. Swallowing back disappointment—he might have liked a chance to behave in normal terms here—he continued, “Let’s just… see where things take us, Kaytoo.”

“Kay,” K-2 answered. “I’d prefer Kay.”

With a grin, Cassian nodded. “Then Kay it is.”

Possibly it would be nothing and possibly they could become the closest partners in the Rebellion.

Cassian, despite everything, couldn’t wait to find out.


End file.
